Two for the Dough (18 page)

He handed me a bulky overnight mail envelope, and I ran back up the stairs.

“Three minutes one way or the other can make or break a pot roast,” I told Morelli, grabbing him by the hand, dragging him across the lot to his truck. I hadn’t intended to go with him, but I figured if we hit traffic he could use his rooftop flasher. “You have a flasher on this truck?” I asked, climbing on board.

Morelli buckled himself in. “Yeah, I have a flasher. You don’t expect me to use it for pot roast, do you?”

I swiveled in my seat and stared out the back window.

Morelli cut his eyes to the rearview mirror. “Are you looking for Kenny?”

“I can feel him out there.”

“I don’t see anyone.”

“That doesn’t mean he isn’t there. He’s good at this sneaking around stuff. He walks into Stiva’s and chops off body parts, and nobody sees him. He came out of nowhere at the mall. He spotted me at Julia Cenetta’s house and in the motel parking lot, and I never had a clue. Now I have this creepy feeling he’s watching me, following me around.”

“Why would he be doing that?”

“For starters, Spiro told Kenny I’d kill him if he continued to harass him.”

“Oh boy.”

“Probably I’m just being paranoid.”

“Sometimes paranoia is justified.”

Morelli stopped for a light. The digital readout on his dashboard clock blinked to 5:58. I cracked my knuckles, and Morelli glanced over at me, eyebrows raised.

“Okay,” I said, “so my mother makes me nervous.”

“It’s part of her job,” Morelli said. “You shouldn’t take it personally.”

We turned off Hamilton, into the burg, and traffic disappeared. There were no car lights behind us, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that Kenny had me in his sights.

My mother and Grandma Mazur were at the door when we parked. Usually it was the differences between my mother and grandmother that caught my attention. Today it was the similarities that seemed obvious. They stood tall, with their shoulders back. It was a defiant posture, and I knew it was my posture, too. Their hands were clasped in front of them, their gaze was unwavering, fixed on Morelli and me. Their faces were round; their eyes were hooded. Mongol eyes. My Hungarian relatives had come from the steppes. Not a city dweller among them. My mother and grandma were small women and had grown even smaller with age. They were dainty-boned and petite, with babyfine hair. Probably they were descended from pampered, caravan-cosseted Gypsy women.

I, on the other hand, was a throwback to some plow-pulling, raw-boned wife of a barbarian farmer.

I hiked up my skirt to jump from the truck, and saw my mother and grandmother flinch at the sight.

“What’s this outfit?” my mother demanded. “Can’t you afford clothes? Are you wearing other people’s? Frank, give Stephanie some money. She needs to buy clothes.”

“I don’t need to buy clothes,” I said. “This is new. I just bought it. It’s the style.”

“How will you ever get a man when you’re dressed like this?” My mother turned to Morelli. “Am I right?”

Morelli grinned. “I think she’s kind of cute. It’s the Monty Hall look.”

I still had the package in my hand. I set it on the foyer table and took my jacket off. “Annie Hall!”

Grandma Mazur picked the envelope up and studied it. “Overnight mail. Must be something important. Feels like there’s a box in here. Return address says R. Klein from Fifth Avenue in New York. Too bad it isn’t for me. I wouldn’t mind getting some overnight mail.”

I hadn’t thought much about the package until now. I didn’t know anyone named R. Klein, and I hadn’t ordered anything from New York. I took the envelope from Grandma and peeled the flap back. There was a little cardboard box inside. It was taped closed. I took the box out, and held it in my hand. It wasn’t especially heavy.

“Smells funny,” Grandma said. “Like insecticide. Or maybe it’s one of them new perfumes.”

I ripped the tape away, opened the box, and sucked in my breath. There was a penis inside the box. The penis was neatly sliced off at the root, perfectly embalmed, and secured to a square of Styrofoam with a hat pin.

Everyone stared at the penis in dumbfounded horror.

Grandma Mazur spoke first, and when she did it was with a touch of wistfulness. “Been a long time since I’ve seen one of those,” she said.

My mother started screaming, hands in air, eyes bugging out of her head. “Get it out of my house! What’s the world coming to? What will people think?”

My father left his chair in the living room and padded out to the hall to see what the fuss was all about. “What’s going on?” he asked, sticking his head into the huddle.

“It’s a penis,” Grandma said. “Stephanie got it in the mail. It’s a pretty good one too.”

My father recoiled. “Jesus and Joseph!”

“Who would do such a thing?” my mother shouted. “What is it? Is it rubber? Is it one of those rubber penises?”

“Don’t look rubber to me,” Grandma Mazur said. “Looks to me like a real penis, except it’s kind of discolored. I don’t remember them being this color.”

“That’s crazy!” my mother said. “What person would mail his penis?”

Grandma Mazur looked at the envelope. “Says Klein on the return address. I always thought that was a Jewish name, but this doesn’t look to me like a Jewish penis.”

Everyone turned their attention to Grandma Mazur.

“Not that I’d know much about it,” Grandma said. “It’s just that I might have seen one of them Jewish ones in
National Geographic
.”

Morelli took the box from me and replaced the lid. We both knew the name to attach to the penis. Joseph Loosey.

“I’m going to take a raincheck on dinner,” Morelli said. “I’m afraid this is a police matter.” He snagged my pocketbook off the hall table and draped it over my shoulder. “Stephanie needs to come too, so she can make a statement.”

“It’s that bounty hunter job,” my mother said to me. “You meet all the wrong kinds of people. Why can’t you get a good job like your cousin Christine? No one ever sends Christine these things in the mail.”

“Christine works in a vitamin factory. She spends her whole day watching the cotton stuffer to make sure it doesn’t malfunction.”

“She makes good money.”

I zipped my jacket. “I make good money … sometimes.”

Morelli yanked the door to the truck open, tossed the overnight envelope onto the seat, and made an impatient gesture for me to follow. His face was composed, but I could feel the vibrations of anger radiating in waves from his body.

“Goddamn him,” Morelli said, slamming the truck into gear. “He thinks this is fucking funny. Him and his damn games. When he was a kid he used to tell me stories about the things he’d done. I never knew what was real and what was made up. I’m not sure Kenny knew. Maybe it was all real.”

“Were you serious about this being a police matter?”

“The post office frowns on the mailing of human body parts for sport purposes.”

“That was why you rushed us out of my parents’ house?”

“I rushed us out of your parents’ house because I didn’t think I could manage two hours at the dinner table with everyone focused on Joe Loosey’s joystick sitting in the refrigerator next to the applesauce.”

“I’d appreciate it if you could keep this quiet. I wouldn’t want people to get the wrong idea about me and Mr. Loosey.”

“Your secret is safe.”

“Do you think we should tell Spiro?”

“I think
you
should tell Spiro. Let him think the two of you are in this together. Maybe you can learn something.”

Morelli eased the truck into the Burger King drivethrough and got a couple bags of food. He rolled the window up, pulled out into traffic, and the truck immediately filled with the smell of America.

“It’s not pot roast,” Morelli said.

That was true, but with the exception of dessert, food is food. I stuck the straw into my milk shake and dug around in the bag for the french fries. “These stories Kenny used to tell you … what were they about?”

“Nothing you want to hear. Nothing I even want to remember. Very sick shit.”

He took a handful of fries. “You never told me how you happened to locate Kenny in the motel.”

“Probably I shouldn’t divulge my professional secrets.”

“Probably you should.”

Okay, public relations time. Time to appease Morelli by giving him some worthless information. With the added advantage of implicating him in an illegal activity. “I broke into Spiro’s apartment and went through his trash. I found some phone numbers, ran them down, and came up with the motel.”

Morelli stopped for a light and turned his face to me. His expression was unreadable in the dark. “You broke into Spiro’s apartment? Was this by way of an accidentally unlocked door?”

“It was by way of a window that managed to get broken by a pocketbook.”

“Shit, Stephanie, that’s breaking and entering. People get arrested for that kind of stuff. They go to jail.”

“I was careful.”

“That makes me feel a lot better.”

“I figure Spiro will think it was Kenny and not report it.”

“So Spiro knew where Kenny was staying. I’m surprised Kenny wasn’t more cautious.”

“Spiro has a caller ID device on his phone at the funeral parlor. Maybe Kenny didn’t realize he could be picked up like that.”

The light changed, Morelli moved forward, and we rode in silence for the rest of the trip. He swung into the lot, parked and cut his lights.

“Do you want to come in, or would you prefer to be left out of the loop?” he wanted to know.

“I’d rather be left out of the loop. I’ll wait here.”

He took the envelope with the penis, and he took a bag of food. “I’ll do this as fast as I can.”

I gave him the paper with the guns and ammo information from Spiro’s apartment. “I found some hardware in Spiro’s bedroom. You might want to check to see if it came from Braddock.” I wasn’t enamored with the idea of helping Morelli when he was still holding back on me, but I had no way of tracing the guns down on my own, and besides, if the stuff was stolen, Morelli’d owe me.

I watched him jog to the side door. The door opened, showing a fleeting rectangle of light in the otherwise dark brick facade. The door closed, and I unwrapped my cheeseburger, wondering if Morelli would have to bring someone in to identify the evidence. Louie Moon or Mrs. Loosey. I hoped he had the sense to remove the hat pin before lifting the lid for Mrs. Loosey.

I scarfed down my cheeseburger and fries and worked at the milk shake. There was no activity in the lot or on the street, and the silence in the truck was deafening. I listened to myself breathe for a while. I snooped in the glove compartment and map pockets. I found nothing interesting. According to Morelli’s dashboard clock he’d been gone for ten minutes. I finished the milk shake and crammed all the wrappers back in the bag. Now what?

It was almost seven. Visiting hours for Spiro. The perfect time to tell him about Loosey’s dick. Unfortunately, I was stuck twiddling my thumbs in Morelli’s truck. The glint of keys dangling from the ignition caught my eye. Maybe I should borrow the truck and slip over to the funeral parlor. Take care of business. After all, who knows how long it would take Morelli to do the paperwork? I could be stuck here for hours! Morelli would probably be grateful to me for getting the job done. On the other hand, if he came out and found his truck missing it could get ugly.

I dug around in my pocketbook and came up with a black Magic Marker. I couldn’t find paper, so I wrote a note on the side of the food bag. I backed the truck up a few feet, deposited the bag in the empty space, jumped back in the truck, and took off.

Lights were blazing from Stiva’s, and a crowd of people milled about on the front porch. Stiva always got a big draw on Saturdays. The lot was full and there were no parking places for two blocks down on the street, so I zoomed into the driveway reserved for “funeral cars only.” I would only be a few minutes, and besides, nobody was going to tow away a truck with a PBA shield in the back window.

Spiro did a double take when he saw me. The first reaction was relief; the second was reserved for my dress.

“Nice outfit,” he said. “You look like you just got off the bus from Appalachia.”

“I’ve got news for you.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve got news for you, too.” He jerked his head in the direction of the office. “In here.”

He hotfooted it across the lobby, wrenched the door to the office open, and closed it behind us with a slam.

“You’re not going to believe this,” he said. “That asshole Kenny is such a prick. You know what he did now? He broke into my apartment.”

My eyes rounded in surprise. “No!”

“Yeah. Can you believe it? Broke a goddamn window.”

“Why would he break into your apartment?”

“Because he’s fucking crazy.”

“Are you sure it was Kenny? Was anything missing?”

“Of course it was Kenny. Who the hell else could it be? Nothing was stolen. The VCR is still there. My camera, my money, my jewelry weren’t touched. It was Kenny, all right. The dumb crazy fucker.”

“Did you report this to the police?”

“What’s between me and Kenny is private. No police.”

“You might have to change that game plan.”

Spiro’s eyes contracted and dulled and focused on mine. “Oh?”

“You remember the little incident yesterday concerning Mr. Loosey’s penis?”

“Yeah?”

“Kenny mailed it to me.”

“No shit?”

“It came Express Mail.”

“Where is it now?”

“The police have it. Morelli was there when I opened the package.”

“
Fuck!
” He kicked his wastebasket across the room. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“I don’t know why you’re so upset about all this,” I cooed. “Seems to me this is crazy Kenny’s problem. I mean, after all, you didn’t do anything wrong.” Humor the jerk, I thought. See where he runs with it.

Spiro stopped raving and looked at me, and I imagined I heard the sound of little bitty gears meshing in his head. “That’s true,” he said. “I didn’t do anything wrong. I’m the victim here. Does Morelli know the package came from Kenny? Was there a note? A return address?”

“No note. No return address. Hard to say what Morelli knows.”

“You didn’t tell him it came from Kenny?”

“I have no real proof that it came from Kenny, but the thing clearly had been embalmed, so the police will be checking funeral parlors. I imagine they’ll want to know why you didn’t report the … um, theft.”

“Maybe I should just come clean. Tell the cops about how crazy Kenny is. Tell them about the finger and about my apartment.”

“What about Con? You coming clean to him too? Is he still in the hospital?”

“Came home today. Got a week of rehab, and then he’ll be back at work part-time.”

“He’s not going to be happy when he finds out his clients have been getting parts whacked off.”

“Tell me about it. I’ve heard enough of his ‘the body is holy’ crap to last me three lifetimes. I mean, what’s the big deal? It isn’t like Loosey was gonna use his dick.”

Spiro dropped into the padded executive chair behind the desk and slid into a slouch. The mask of civility dropped from his face, and his sallow skin tightened over slanted cheekbones and pinched across spiky teeth as he morphed into Rodent Man. Furtive, foul-breathed, evil-spirited. Impossible to tell if he’d been born the rodent, or if years of schoolyard taunts had shaped his soul to suit his face.

Spiro leaned forward. “You know how old Con is? Sixty-two. Anyone else would be thinking retirement, but not Constantine Stiva. I’ll be dead from natural causes, and Stiva’ll still be kissing ass. He’s like a snake with a heart rate of twelve. Pacing himself. Sucking formaldehyde like the elixir of life. Hanging on just to piss me off.

“Should have been cancer instead of a back injury. What the hell good is a back injury? You don’t die from a damn back injury.”

“I thought you and Con got along.”

“He drives me nuts. Him and his rules and goody-goody attitude. You should see him in the embalming room. Everything just so. You’d think it was a fucking shrine down there. Constantine Stiva at the altar of the fucking dead. You know what I think of the dead? I think they stink.”

“Why do you work here?”

“There’s money to be made, chicky. And I like money.”

I held myself tight in check to keep from physically recoiling. Here was the muck and slime of Spiro’s brain, spilling out of every orifice, dribbling down his corded neck onto his pristine white undertaker’s shirt. Butthead, all dressed up with no place to go. “Have you heard from Kenny since he broke into your apartment?”

“No.” Spiro turned broody. “Used to be we were friends. Him and Moogey and me used to do everything together. Then Kenny went into the army, and he got different. Thought he was smarter than the rest of us. Had all these big ideas.”

“Like what?”

“I can’t tell you, but they were big. Not that I couldn’t come up with ideas like that, but I’m busy with other stuff.”

“He include you in these big ideas? You make any money from them?”

“Sometimes he included me. You never knew with Kenny. He was slick. He’d hold out, and you never knew. He was like that with women. They all thought he was this cool guy.” Spiro’s lips pulled back in a smile. “Used to crack us up how he’d play the faithful-till-death-do-us-part boyfriend role and all the while he’d be porking everyone in sight. He could really sucker women in. Even when he smacked them around they kept coming back for more. You had to admire the guy, you know. He had something. I’ve seen him burn women with cigarettes and stick them with pins, and they’d still suck up to him.”

The cheeseburger slid in my stomach. I didn’t know who was more disgusting … Kenny for sticking pins in women, or Spiro for admiring him. “I should be moving along,” I said. “Got things to do.” Like maybe fumigating my mind after talking to Spiro.

“Wait a minute. I wanted to talk to you about security. You’re an expert in this kind of stuff, right?”

I wasn’t an expert at anything. “Right.”

“So, what should I do about Kenny? I was thinking about a bodyguard again. Just for at night. Someone to close up with me here, and make sure I got into my apartment okay. I figure I was lucky Kenny wasn’t waiting for me in my apartment.”

“You’re afraid of Kenny?”

“He’s like smoke. You can’t put your finger on him. He’s always in a shadow somewhere. He watches people. He plans things.” Our eyes locked. “You don’t know Kenny,” Spiro said. “Sometimes he’s a real fun guy, and sometimes the things he thinks are pure evil. Believe me, I’ve seen him in action, you don’t want to be on the receiving side of the evil.”

“I told you before … I’m not interested in guarding your body.”

He took a pack of twenties from his top desk drawer and counted them out. “Hundred dollars a night. All you have to do is get me into my apartment safe and sound. I’ll take it from there.”

Suddenly I saw the value of guarding Spiro. I’d be right there on the spot if Kenny actually did show up. I’d be in a position to wheedle information. And I could legally search through Spiro’s house every night. Okay, so along with all that I was selling out for the money, but hell, it could be worse. I could have sold out for fifty. “When do I start?”

“Tonight. I close up at ten. Get here five or ten minutes ahead.”

“Why me? Why don’t you get some big tough guy?”

Spiro put the money back in the drawer. “I’d look like a fag. This way people think you’re after my ass. Better for my image. Unless you keep wearing dresses like that. Then I might reconsider.”